What is the best way to promote the safe use of social media by staff

A total of 43 teachers were referred to the General Teaching Council for England in 2011 for unprofessional conduct related to the use of social media sites.

14 of these teachers were suspended and 18 were placed on probation.

As a result the NUT have recently advised all schools that they should have policies in place making it clear what teachers should and should not do in the virtual space.

Which is in fact a lot more difficult than it sounds, not least because of the fact that social media is changing day by day.

To help overcome this problem we have liaised with internet and teaching experts to create a trusted, cohesive, accessible and robust school-wide policy that provides clear distinctions between public and private use of the medium and which covers the safe and appropriate use of social media by members of staff.

The policy document is available to download online from www.iTeachingResources.com. It can be purchased as a stand-alone document and then distributed in electronic or hard copy format within a matter of minutes to all members of staff.

The resource helps educational establishments to ensure that the use of social media by staff ensuring that the usage:

  • Does not bring the school into disrepute
  • Does not bring the teacher into disrepute
  • Does not expose the school to legal liability
  • Reflects ‘safer internet’ practices
  • Minimises risks associated with the personal use of social media by professionals and
  • Reflects the school’s standard of behaviour and staff code of conduct.

The safe use code was written by teacher Tom Tolkien, a Senior Manager with extensive experience of whole school assessment, internet and e-safety as well as initiative and policy development.

The document provides practical step-by-step guides to applying recommended privacy settings on popular social networking sites, with explanations on how to determine if posts, comments, images, links and videos shared on a profile by a teacher are appropriate and transparent.

The policy also includes information for teaching staff about maintaining privacy and keeping personal information such as phone numbers and addresses private while using their own or school equipment.

Detailed guidelines regarding communication with parents and pupils cover sites like Facebook and Twitter, acceptable content for social network profiles and how to respond to initiated contact from pupils. The policy concludes with guidance on recognising exceptions and reporting abuse or cyber bullying.

The policy document for acceptable use of social media by staff in educational establishments is priced at £49.99, but you can save 5% by quoting HH12SMP when you order from www.iTeachingResources.com

or

Phone: 0113 2660880
Fax: 0113 2697889
Email: orders@iteachingresources.com
Post to: iTeachingResources, Allerton House, 75 Allerton Hill, Leeds, LS7 3QB.

What is the most effective way to challenge the youngsters who get every spelling right, all the time?

It’s the same old story: Letters and sounds. (Or put another way: Lttrs n snds).

How can we persuade children who get 90% or more in all spelling tests to develop an interest in the written language?

To practise spelling children need to use letters and sounds over and over. They need to embrace letters, get to know spellings, and in essence see the written language as a central part of their lives.

This means practice and exercises – and that is what makes up the books we sell. We provide structured, organised, practice and exercise.

But we would also suggest that sometimes it is worth stopping the lessons and playing a little game.

Such as getting the children to wrt wrds wth th vwls tkn out. A e i e ooas ae ou. (And then with the consonants taken out). Strange that, isn’t it, that words without consonants are harder to decipher than words without vowels? But it generally doesn’t take children long to work out why – and playing games with words and letters enhances their grasp of what is going on.

Sometimes they might be asked to write their names backwards. There’s one colleague who even got so far as to read out the class register with the names backwards. Never has registration been so enjoyable.

Does it help them to spell? There’s no real proof. But it is a spelling activity that genuinely is highly enjoyable for the children. (It is one of the activities that most children report to their parents that evening and remember for years to come.)

Quite simply because it makes letters and spellings interesting – not so much alien abstracts sent to torment children but rather items to be played with, experimented with, have fun with. And through that process – learned.

It is the theory of the “occasional pause”. The stepping back from a theme can re-motivate the children. (It can also be a game that parents can play with their children at home.)

So the message is, sp*ll*ng has to be learned, but can also be f*n.

Free sample pages of our Spelling Practice KS2 revision (Phases 3-6) and Spelling Practice KS2 Extension (Phase 18+) books are available on our website atwww.topical-resources.co.uk/literacy

(And just to be clear, we don’t have words with vowels removed in the test. That was just our way of stressing the point: we all see the written language through different eyes.)

If you would like to know more please call 01772 863158 or email us at enquiries@topical-resources.co.uk

You can order in any of these ways:

  • On our website
  • By phone on: 01772 863158
  • By fax: 01772 866153
  • By email: Sales@topical-resources.co.uk
  • By post: Topical Resources, P.O. Box329, Broughton, Preston, Lancashire PR3 5LT